I Love My Husband But I Still Want Sex From You!

Times Have Changed Infidelity Has Not

Infidelity goes back to Jesus' day when the Pharisees brought Jesus a woman caught in the act of adultery (to be stoned to death). Jesus said: "He who hath no sin amongst you, cast the first stone."

What really makes a woman want to cheat? Are there any hidden/underlying reasons for her decision?

At 24 I became a waiter in Ocean Beach, CA. With no waiting experience, I walked into The Old Ocean Beach Cafe and met with Shannon (the manager). I told her the only experience I had was bussing tables. Shannon was young, married, and hired me on the spot. The following week she invited me to go wine tasting with her, (boring I thought) yet not wanting to disappoint her, I went. As our outing progressed into the afternoon, Shannon told me about her marital problems. I began to realize this was becoming a date. She was interested in wine and in me, unbeknownst to me I had just walked into a fowler's snare. In the basement of my mind, I knew I had to please her because she hired me (this was survival). Now it was time to wear another hat.

She confided in me and explained her husband wasn't satisfying her. Insinuating for my help, I felt trapped. We left the wine tasting and went to the beach, quickly our conversation floundered, we kissed and had sex under the pier, it would be a routine I would become familiar with. I didn't know what to think after the initial act. Was I being a good Samaritan, an ox led to the slaughter, or a male prostitute?

There are many reasons for infidelity such as revenge, boredom, the thrill of sexual novelty, and sexual addiction-says Tammy Worth of WebMD. "But experts say that a large majority of the time, motivations differ by gender with men searching for more sex or attention and women looking to fill an emotional void." I'd like to agree with Tammy, women are looking to fill an emotional void, men aren't. So what's this emotional void women are trying to fill?

Our rendezvous went on for about three months, there was no love between us. How did I know this? Well, Shannon wasn't buying me flowers, she was comping me beers at work. It was sex. The same kind of sex I had in a college dorm, meaningless. One day she invited me to go with her to her place at lunchtime (to get something). Her husband was supposed to be at work. He came home for lunch and we met. I was awkward and he was a nice guy. Now I felt like a chump. Whether he had been satisfying her or not, she was still his wife, and I was the bad guy, that's the bottom line.

Fueled by drugs and alcohol, our sexual liaisons continued, that's the only way I could continue. Then one day the owner of the building (where we worked) saw us both coming out of a bathroom, the next day I was fired. Shortly thereafter Shannon left her husband and moved back to Arizona to be with her family.

Why We Cheat and the By-product

If you're a woman and wonder why men cheat - Rutgers University biological anthropologist Helen Fisher, author of Why Him? Why Her? and Why We Love,says men cheat for sex and are less likely to fall in love with an extramarital partner. Fisher says "women tend to have an emotional connection with their lover and are more likely to have an affair because of loneliness." -why women cheat

Statistics show that 30-60% of American couples will engage in infidelity at some point in their marriage. Research consistently shows that 2 to 3% of all children are the product of infidelity -paternity testing. I am a product of infidelity. I never knew or met my biological father. As a child, half of my identity was wrapped up in him, and "not knowing" who my real father was, caused me a lot grief growing up.

Fisher says; "while men can be a lot happier in their primary relationship and also cheat. Women are more interested in supplementing their marriage or jumping ship than men are -- for men, it is a secondary strategy as opposed to an alternate lifestyle for women."

I've learned in school that women have more neurons ("wires") in their brain that connect both right and left hemispheres of their brain, thus getting them very much in touch with their feelings. This might have something to do with their need to talk, to be noticed, and be continually validated.

Consenting Adults

Seeing my mother with different men growing up and seeing the verbal abuse my stepfather gave her (maybe her cheating was justified), I dealt with it, yet harbored major contempt for these "men" she had spent time with. One of them drove me around to do errands for her, I was disgusted and saddened at the same time.

As an adult, I had become one of these "weasels." Thinking I could get away with fornication (got caught) and thinking the guilt would subside, it didn't. There's no way of sugar coating adultery. We reap what we sow, more than we sow and later than we sow. After the day I got fired I vowed never to get involved with another man's wife again. Few years down the road, I caught my girlfriend cheating on me, it was emotionally devastating. I got a taste of my own medicine and rightfully so.

Time To Go

At 47 I was being trained by this young, attractive, physically fit, married woman at the gym. This woman had characteristics I admired and our mutual sexual attraction was immediately made obvious. We laid down next to each other in the gym and we rolled on foam rollers looking at each other as if in bed, she stared at my compression underwear sticking out from the bottom of my shorts, I was transfixed by her eyes, it was lust all-right. Yet in my heart, I remembered back to that day in Ocean Beach, how a novel thrill ride had gone awry and caused so much damage. Oh, I was teetering, the temptation and flirtations were adulterous, to say the least. She would watch me as I lifted weights and swim laps in the pool. Thankfully circumstances had me switch to a different gym for six months, when I came back, she was gone. Prior to her leaving, my lust switched off, and then all of a sudden I felt the gym shrink (because she was looking at me all the time), I was working out in a fish bowl.

Practically speaking, does a woman think about how she'll feel after the affair or act? Does her emotional void ever get filled? Does she feel there will be any serious consequences? Does a secret like infidelity throw up an invisible wall in front of her significant other? Is there any guilt or remorse? I believe yes to all these questions save one, yet the heat of passion and the wanting to be continually loved and accepted, buries all consequences.

Family Roots

My mother died at an early age and I wondered why she had harvested such emotional pain (void) her entire life. Later I hypothesized it stemmed from a lack of emotional support and love coming from my grandfather. My mother had one brother (Uncle Neil) whom my grandfather cherished. Uncle Neil would later become a wealthy dentist and hospital owner. As adults, my mother and uncle fought for years (over the inheritance), eventually they would never speak to each other again, she grew to despise him. At the age of nine our families broke apart and I lost the only extended family I knew. Her brother didn't attend her funeral.

My mother at 15 years old, was involved with a 33 year old man. Letters they wrote each other were passed on to me after her death. The lack of love and support from her father hurt her bad, she never got over it, her cure (so she thought) to hide her pain, would be a life of infidelity. Coming to grips with this realization, I saw how the infidelity never solved her pain. It only hastened my mother's demise. She passed on at 62, she was addicted to surgeries and the medications that came along with them. Her last needless back surgery did her in, she bled to death on the operating table.

In Conclusion

"Do not commit adultery" is one of God's Ten Commandments in order to protect us and our families from a life of emotional pain and destruction. Infidelity is cheating on a significant other, married or not, a selfish act, and an impulsive act of the flesh. It takes root in the mind and is carried out by the body. The act itself lasts but a brief moment yet the memories and emotional damage it causes lasts a lifetime (unless you have no conscience). There are no happy outcomes with infidelity, it's a "Ponzi" scheme that inevitably unravels in the end. You always get caught.

Infidelity will never fill an emotional void. It may be exciting and feel extremely good while it happens, and for some, an addiction, that never satisfies. As with all addictions, we become slaves to them, we hide them and try to bury the emotional aftermath. Sex Addicts Anonymous have members equating sex with love and not being alone. Some admit in the end, underneath the mirage, they never felt so alone, even while committing the act.